Historic Sparta Gallery
7 Liberty Street before Vanderlip restoration. Front porch was removed to west side of house to face the river.
7 and 9 Liberty Street circa 1910. The porch on 7 Liberty faces the street. 9 Liberty was a divided building with saloon and a residence. It was torn down in about 1920. Click here for more information on these two homes.
7 Liberty Street, rear view, after Vanderlip restoration. Porch now faces the river rather than the street.
9 Liberty Street, rear view. This house was moved from across the street (at 6 Liberty) during Vanderlip restoration circa 1920. The house was turned so porch faces the river.
Liberty Street looking east from 4 Liberty circa 1918. Note that the old saloon on left is still standing and there is still a house on 6 Liberty Street lot, which was moved across the street to 9 Liberty.
Liberty Street looking west toward the river around 1918. 12 Liberty Street on the left is under construction, the rounded front entry is new. The old saloon at 9 Liberty has not yet come down.
North side of Liberty street circa 1930. 7 and 9 Liberty much as they are today.
2 Liberty Street (ca. 1920) built by Thomas Agate about 1820. The iron fence added during Vanderlip restoration came from remodeling of First National City Bank building in New York City. Two sons, Alfred and Frederick Agate, were founders of the National Academy of Design; their sister Harriet Agate Carmichael also exhibited at the Academy.
12 Liberty Street, about 1920. This is the rear view of the house known as the “Round House” at the center of Sparta. At one time a hotel, this was one of the first structures restored by Vanderlip. The original building was the part of the building on the left of the chimney. Vanderlip added the back porch, the right wing and one-story ktichen, connecting all on the street side with a curved facade. Click here for more information on this historic building.
1 Rockledge Ave. The original portions of this brick building and 12 Libery Street on the opposite corner date to the 1780s. The owner, Josiah Rhodes, operated a mustard mill on Sparta Brook.
Looking south to Sparta from hillside above, circa 1918. 338 Spring Street is in left foreground; the rear view of 9 Liberty before demolition, and 7 Liberty are to the right.
Pencil drawing of Sparta in 1873 as it appeared from Mount Murray (where Scarborough Manor stands today), by Ezra B. Hunt, artist, muscian, and Sparta resident.
Calvary Chapel of the Sing Sing Presbyterian Church. Built in 1887 on Fairview Place, the building was converted into a private residence in 1923. Click here for more information on this historic building.
One of the early schoolhouses in Ossining, the Sparta schoolhouse was established about 1840 at the corner of Spring Street and Fairview Place. This photo is from about 1900, the school closed in 1907 after Sparta was incorporated into the Village of Ossining. Click here for more information on this property.
The one-room Sparta School house, sketched in 1869 by Ezra B.Hunt at the age of 19. A second story was added by 1900. The building still stands at the corner of Spring Street and Fairview Place. It now contains apartments.
The Jug Tavern, or Davids-Garrison House, 74 Revolutionary Road. This photo was taken about 1976, the same year the building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places and the Town of Ossining purchased the building following a grassroots movement to save and preserve the building. Click here for more information on this historic building.
“Village of Sing Sing” (1839), steel engraving of illustration by William Henry Bartlett (1809-1854). Bartlett was a British landscape artist who traveled in America in the 1830s and published the scenes with text by Nathaniel Parker in installments under the title American Scenery; or Land, Lake and River: Illustrations of Transatlantic Nature.
“Village of Sing-Sing” (ca. 1830) oil on canvas by Hugh Reinagle (1790-1834), an American landscape painter and a founding member of the National Academy of Design.
Construction of Secor Road retaining wall using Sing Sing marble, completed 1897. Sing Sing marble was quarried in Sparta at the foot of Spring Street.
Stone quarry on Spring Street at bottom of Fairview Place. Note tracks for transporting loads of rocks. Calvary Chapel crowns the hill.
Sing Sing Prison circa 1890. The 1825 cellblock (the long building on the left parallel to road) is built of Sing Sing marble, quarried in Sparta at corner of Spring Street and Fairview Place.
Spring Street looking south to Liberty Street. Note storefront (center) at 2 Rockledge, now a multi-unit residence. A truck seems to have slipped off the road into 338 Spring Street.
11 Liberty Street. This building was constructed before 1800. It has had many lives. It was the “Branch House” hotel in the 19th century, and a grocery and general store around 1900. Today it is residential.
Members of the Arnold family on the steps of Rocklege, their home. Clinton S. Arnold was a civil engirneer and architect. His wife was Cornelia Cole.
Rockledge, built by Clinton S. Arnold in the 1890s of rose granite on top of Mount Murray. The home was destroyed by fire in 1925 and later demolished for the construction of the Scarborough Manor apartment complex.
Frank Vanderlip (1864-1937) shown here in 1917 during his tenure as president of the First National City Bank. The Vanderlips, who lived on their Scarborough estate Beechwood, purchased and rehabilitated some 30 properties in Sparta in 1919-1921.
Narcissa Cox Vanderlip (1879-1966) shown here with two children in 1913. Narcisa was the mother of six and best known for her work as a suffragist. Later she was elected chairman of the League of Women Voters.
The Vanderlips who had a deep interest in education built the Scarborough School in 1912 so their children would have quality education near home (photo from about 1970).
Beechwood estate in Scarborough, New York, the home of the Vanderlip family from 1906. The property remained in the family until 1979.
Children at play in Sparta Dock.
Bob Davis, as a young boy, near Sparta Dock.
Bob Davis, again, at 7 Liberty Street.
Illustration of the Sparta Mustard Mill on Sparta Brook (1870). Sparta had a mill on Sparta Brook as early as 1795. Josiah Rhodes who ran the mill in partnership with William Kemeys describes the mill in his will as three wooden buildings (about 1805). It is not known how long the mill operated into the 19th century.
329 Spring Street shown here about 1900 was built in 1834. The porch and southern wing (not in picture) were added later.
